Friday, 30 December 2011

I just finished this set of saddle and tape for Joachim over in Austin, Texas. I really love the leather on this one, it's a vegetable tanned cow skin and comes complete with scars and all. It has a real authentic leather quality to it and with use it will polish up and deepen in colour. A pleasure working with Joachim, he provided me with a really clear design brief, including some very nice sketches, and left plenty of room for my own ideas. As already seen on the Serotta Forum .

Tuesday, 27 December 2011

That's the saddle I restored a couple of weeks ago. It's a Christmas bike so only posted now, post Christmas. A really cute Malvern Star, 24"step through restored by Fly in Horsham for his girlfriend. He repainted the frame, fenders and chain guard, had other parts re-chromed, got some wheels with a lot of spokes and asked me to match the saddle to the leather grips. Looking forward to seeing more of Fly's projects.

Friday, 16 December 2011

Panelled, quilted and piped; a play on the classic quilted look saddle. The original was vinyl with fake embossed quilting. Now recovered in kid skin with real stitched quilting. An interesting project, quite a different beast to the modern sports saddle and requiring a modified set of techniques. Luckily we managed to find a leather that almost perfectly matches the grips Richard "Fly" sourced online. Red frame with new paint and fenders painted up to match the leather work. Looking forward to viewing the final product.

Only one photo worked out worked out for this shoot. Richard is giving a complete overhaul refurbish on a Malvern Star 5 Star. He had the bars nickel plated, polished up the ornate stem and had me apply this perforated leather bar wrap. Black on black with baseball style stitching and graduating perforation size. A new kind of classic.

Monday, 28 November 2011

A new saddle - tape combo for Andy's Moser refurbishment. Dan at Shifter Bikes is doing the mechanical stuff and Andy asked me to do the leather trims. Being born in the Chinese year of the ox is the reasoning behind the embossed buffalo skull motif. Kangaroo skin on the saddle and cow hide for the tape which is split down the middle and stitched through to a red backing. Hand skived and perforated.

Thursday, 10 November 2011

Matching set of saddle and tape for Rob's brand new custom built Baum Corretto. The frame is metallic black with venom green and the saddle is styled to match in black kangaroo with venom green underlay. All the best for your exams Rob.

Friday, 14 October 2011

For Robert in Queensland - some pretty heavy duty double toe straps with pink perforations to match the Fizik Arione recover in black kangaroo with Braille perforations. The pink is something close to 'Rapha' pink and the saddle says something like "f#@k art just dance". A nice little set, must do a black kangaroo saddle for myself one of these days. My latest leather pieces are two kangaroo tails in black, they're more textured and tougher looking than the main part of the hide.

Friday, 30 September 2011

Another basic SMP recover, this time in simple black, hand dyed kangaroo. It's a 'lively' leather with real character which will only get better with use. Dynamic is the model and Parlee Z3 is the bike.

White SMP Composit recover with a swift swallow motif hand embroidered on the seat. To match Bridie's custom painted frame. The jury is still out on the embroidery application, I expect a finer thread will deliver a more practical outcome.

Friday, 23 September 2011

As I've said before, I really like this worn old red Turbo, there was something special about it, the beauty of the worn leather. Not so functional though. The refurbished saddle has had some minor foam repairs and is now recovered in red kid skin. The owner's name subtly monogrammed around the back of the seat and the logo badges retouched with red enamel. Now off to NSW.